Mark Rein: Intel Held Back Innovation On the PC

For years we tried to convince Intel to fix their graphics but their data said they were good enough. PC innovation suffered for it.— Mark Rein (@MarkRein) May 18, 2013

Epic Games president Mark Rein claims that he tried for years to convince Intel to fix its graphics.

Unless you are playing CryTek's latest tech-demo-disguised-as-a-game, chances are you aren't stressing your PC to the absolute maximum. There are very few PC games these days that force gamers to upgrade their graphics cards, whereas just a few years ago it was quite common for games to really push the boundaries of PC graphics technology. I rode out an Nvidia 8800 GT for something ridiculous like 5 years before seeing the need to upgrade. Epic Games president Mark Rein says that there is more at work here than just low-system requirement indie games, blaming Intel for directly holding back innovation on the PC.

"For years we tried to convince Intel to fix their graphics," claims Rein via Twitter, "but their data said they were good enough. PC innovation suffered for it." Rein didn't clarify the exact timeframe these attempts took place in, but later replied to a user that it was a time when "Intel still owned the lions' share of the graphics market with integrated. That's why their data said it was good enough."

This is a very interesting perspective to anyone who knows anything about PC building. Intel dominates installations, thanks to integration, and for desktop activities, browsers and video playback, Intel's hardware is more than adequate for a majority of users. Simply put, despite graphics giants Nvidia and AMD pushing each other with more and more powerful cards, it doesn't account for anything because the majority of users are sitting on Intel's integrated chip, which means PC developers have to scale games back to the "lowest common denominator."

These days, Intel has picked up the slack a bit, doubling and tripping the power of its integrated GPU's, but who knows what kind of super crazy realistic graphics we could be looking at if they got their act together back in the day?